The power of photography takes center stage at the SkirballCultural Center with is current exhibit, This Light of Ours: Activists of the Civil Rights Movement. The exhibition highlights the work of nine photographers primarily affiliated with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating (SNCC) in the 1960s.
Unlike Photojournalists who only wrote on breaking news events from an outsiders perspective, these nine photographers, of different ethnic, racial, religious and geographic backgrounds, lived within the Movement and documented its activities by focusing on local people and socially-engaged students to portray community life as well as protest. The photographs are personal and emotional showing us that this Movement was fought by thousands of “ordinary” Americans. You look into the eyes of these courageous young peoples whose moral vision and impact continue to shape our lives.
In addition to the photographs, the exhibition will include audio recording of the photographers recalling their time in the Movement as well as protest music, posters, newspapers, and informational booklets from the 1960s. These objects along with the SNCC photographs reveal how the organization used photography to raise awareness of their activism.
The final section of the Skirball’s presentation highlights the enduring fight of voting rights taking place across the country today.
On view through February 25, 2024
RECLAIMED: A Family Painting
Immerse yourself in the journey of one family, and one painting from 1920s Czechoslovakia to contemporary Los Angeles. The exhibition tell the story of three generations of women who spent over eighty years trying to recover what the Nazis had stolen from their Jewish family during the Holocaust.
On view through March 3, 2024
The American Library
This is an imaginative portrait of a nation by internationally recognized Yinka Shonibare that explores how ideas of citizenship, home and nationalism hold complex meanings.
The exhibition creates a library setting where the shelves are filled with more than six thousand books individually wrapped in Shonibare’s signature Dutch wax-printed cotton textiles. Each book bears a name on its spine of a notable American individual. First-and second-generation immigrants and Black Americans affected by the Great Migration are featured alongside one another. A further set of books features the names of people who have spoken against immigration, equality of diversity in America.
This juxtaposition touches on current debates about immigration Viewers are invited consider the varied peoples and cultural sources that inform our sense of history and culture, and thus shape out own sense of belonging.
On view through September 1, 2024